Wearable Soft Technologies for Haptic Sensing and Feedback

Abstract

Virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) systems have garnered recent widespread attention due to increased accessibility, functionality, and affordability. These systems sense user inputs and typically provide haptic, audio, and visual feedback to blend interactive virtual environments with the real world for an enhanced or simulated reality experience. With applications ranging from immersive entertainment, to teleoperation, to physical therapy, further development of this technology has the potential for impact across multiple disciplines. However, VR/AR devices still face critical challenges that hinder integration into everyday life and additional applications; namely, the rigid and cumbersome form factor of current technology that is incompatible with the dynamic movements and pliable limbs of the human body. Recent advancements in the field of soft materials are uniquely suited to provide solutions to this challenge. Devices fabricated from flexible and elastic bio‐compatible materials have significantly greater compatibility with the human body and could lead to a more natural VR/AR experience. This review reports state‐of‐the‐art experimental studies in soft materials for wearable sensing and haptic feedback in VR/AR applications, explores emerging soft technologies for on‐body devices, and identifies current challenges and future opportunities toward seamless integration of the virtual and physical world.

Progress in the Triboelectric Human–Machine Interfaces (HMIs)-Moving from Smart Gloves to AI/Haptic Enabled HMI in the 5G/IoT Era

“…Noticeably, the consistency between the artificially stimulated sensation and the real sensation to humans is the key to improve the user experience and the value of the feedback information. Therefore, a majority of the feedback research is also focusing on the biomimetic stimulators, include kinesthetic feedback which can reflect the spatial movement of different body parts, and cutaneous feedback which is in charge of performing the tactile and thermal stimulations to various skin's receptors [293][294][295][296].…”

Actuating Compact Augmented Reality Devices by Artificial Muscle

“…where 𝐹𝐹 𝐶𝐶𝐶𝐶𝑆𝑆𝐶𝐶 , 𝑚𝑚 𝐿𝐿𝑡𝑡𝑏𝑏𝑜𝑜 , 𝑎𝑎, and 𝑔𝑔 are the actuation force of the CASA, mass of the applied load, acceleration of the mass, and gravitational acceleration, respectively; further, p and 𝑚𝑚 𝐶𝐶𝐶𝐶𝑆𝑆𝐶𝐶 are the specific power and mass of CASA, respectively, and 𝑣𝑣 is the velocity. The peak of the specific power density can be calculated from Equation (11), as shown in Supplementary Fig. 7e.…”

Magnetized Micropillar-Enabled Wearable Sensors for Touchless and Intelligent Information Communication

“…[1][2][3]. The key component of an HMI or intelligent system is the communication interface that can swiftly transmit commands from humans to machines, or provide timely and precise feedback conversely [4][5][6]. Particularly, recent advances in flexible and smart sensors, which can directly convert external stimuli into detectable electric signals, have revealed the suitability as communication devices for information capturing, encoding and transferring [7][8][9][10][11].…”